


Aw, Dream! No.

by tisfan



Series: Imagine Clint and Coulson prompts [3]
Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Comfort, M/M, Nightmares, because Coulson's kinda a dick, did you taze me bro, sort of, why does coulson have a tazer in bed?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-12
Updated: 2017-03-12
Packaged: 2018-10-02 12:24:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 928
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10217924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tisfan/pseuds/tisfan
Summary: Clint has nightmares... also, apparently, he crawls through the vents in his sleep...and Coulson takes a taser to bed.





	

_Mind control isn’t what he’d thought it would be._  

 _He’d been a fucking carnie, for shit’s sake; he’d seen various hypnotists do their thing, get people to cluck like chickens, or dance around the room, or whatever various bullshit things that Dr. Mysterio had made his volunteers do. But even there, the victims had to be willing; Clint had never seen anyone do something against their moral code. And even some people had managed to break out of the trance, sweating and shaking. They could fight it._  

 _What Loki did wasn’t enhanced theta waves; it wasn’t a suggestive state. It was straight up kicking Clint’s psyche to the curb and leaving Loki with full control. Clint could see… but not stop. And it wasn’t even like Loki’s personality went into Clint; Clint was still acting exactly like himself; he knew everything that he’d always known._  

 _Like being kicked out of his own house and watching someone else go through his life, watching his shows, emailing his friends… and then burning the whole fucking thing down for amusement._  

 _Nat had punched him in the head and that had… rattled something loose. Given him back his housekey. Something. But Clint was pretty damn sure that the only reason it worked was because Loki had spread his influence so damn thin and Clint had been fighting tooth and nail as it was --_  

 _Always, in his dreams, the same thing._  

 _Nat hit him. And nothing happened. He just kept going. He gets a hand around her throat and it’s blissful to squeeze the air out of her, to watch her choke and gag and eventually still under her hand._  

 _Which is almost always when he wakes up. Nat dead. By his hand. And Loki_ lets him go _. Lets him go, long enough that he can fully absorb what it is that he’s done._  

When he woke up this night, there was a warm throat under his hand. Someone… touched him. He reached down. Squeezed. 

A cold hand grasped at Clint’s wrist, the face came into focus. 

“Sorry,” Phil said, mouthed really, but Clint’s always known how to read lips. Sorry? Sorry for -- 

 _BZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZt_  

“Ow!” Clint yelled as a jolt of current ran through his hand, forcing him to let go, forcing him back and he fell onto the floor -- he blinked in confusion a few times; in the dream he’d been kneeling over Nat, but if he was waking up, shouldn’t he be in bed? -- to whine and grasp at suddenly numbed fingers. If there’s anything of Loki still in his head, Phil just tazed it out of existence. 

“Sorry,” Phil said, again. He touched his throat gingerly with the fingers of his artificial hand. “I thought maybe you’d prefer I wake you up before it got to the whole ‘having to report to medical’ thing.” 

“You _tazed_ me?” Clint demanded, incredulous. Usually when Phil woke him up from a nightmare, it was with a shake to the shoulder, or, on a few unpleasant occasions, he threw a glass of water in Clint’s face. 

Phil sat up from his lounging position on the bed. What the -- where was he? Clint stared around. 

“You kinda sleep-crawled through the vents into my room,” Phil said. “I didn’t really have time to plan.” 

Oh. 

 _Oh_! 

Oh, dream, no. Not again! Because hadn’t he been dreaming about Phil _before_ the nightmare started? His handler, his friend, who’d come back from the dead. Hadn’t he been dreaming of kisses and sweet touches and then Loki’s sceptre was there, dripping red with Clint’s blood and the nightmare had started in earnest. He’d done that a few times now; crawling through the vents to check on Phil, to make sure he was still here. Still alive. Alive again. Something. But this time… this time the dream had changed to something dark, and he’d almost hurt -- 

Clint started to get up, started to apologize and he couldn’t manage it. He staggered, stumbled, and he was in Phil’s arms and Phil was running soothing fingers over his back and hair and neck. 

“It’s all right, Clint,” Phil said, soft and low in his ear. “I’m here. I’m all right. You don’t have to worry about that anymore. Loki’s gone. The mind-stone’s gone. You’re safe.” 

Clint latched onto the only thing that mattered. _Phil was here. He was all right._  

“Look, come on,” Phil was saying, scootching over in the bed -- _what was he doing?_ \-- and making room. “We both need sleep and this is the third night in a row you’ve woken me up sleepwalking. Just stay here. We’ll both rest easier.” 

“Sir, I almost killed you.” 

Phil scoffed. “What’s a little breath play between friends? I’ll taze you again if I have to, but I think you’ll be better off if you don’t get the chance to get worried. Your subconscious will feel you here, and you’ll just go back to sleep.” 

Clint shook his head. This was a damn dumb idea. And then Phil flipped the blankets at him, invitingly. And Clint saw a little bit more of his handler than perhaps Phil had meant for him to see. Or -- looking down at himself -- maybe it was just evening up the circumstances. It’s not like Clint had put tac-gear on, before he’d gone crawling through the vents. 

“Right,” Clint said. He slithered into the bed and Phil spooned up against his back. “I’m sure I’ll get _loads_ of sleep like this.” 

“Well, maybe,” Phil said, soft and breathy in his ear, “we can look forward to no sleep whatsoever.”


End file.
